The Promotions Tab: Love or Hate?

For all the effort that I know that so many marketers put forth trying to make sure that their emails are delivered to Gmail and at least land in the Promotions Tab (vs. the Junk folder), I ask you this: Is the Promotions tab really all that it’s cracked up to be?

Reality: EVERYONE checks their personal email on their phones. Eh … well, your work emails, too.

When I posted a (very short straw) poll on Twitter about whether people loved or hated spending time sifting through all their emails in the Promotions tab, this was what I got:

I’m fairly certain that the bias in the audiences that follow me on Twitter skewed more towards the digital and email marketing profession. When I posed the same question to a more of a friends and family audience on Facebook, I got a different response

I’m not making any claims to statistical significance of these poll results. Nor do i claim that J-Lo hates the Promotions tab or that Daniel Bryan loves it. But doesn’t it make you wonder how connected your customers are to brands who send emails all … the … time?

Is it love? Is it hate? is it just a resignation to the fact that while 7 out of 10 consumers prefer to receive email communications from businesses over direct mail, SMS, and push messages (Adestra study), that preference may not exactly translate into a desire to look through all those emails? Would you call a reluctant cruise through the Promotions tab a quality brand touchpoint?

Why do I think the promotional email user experience within the Gmail universe should not be overlooked? Gmail is the #1 reading environment according to data gathered by Litmus.

Let’s not just assume that everything’s good as long as your email gets delivered to Gmail. Make sure you’re adding value in the content and offers that you send as promotional emails otherwise, you may just be contributing to the disenchantment of your customers.